At Home, Not Alone

Karl Lisovsky and Janet Goodwin heeded the newsletter’s call for stories of mutual aid during the pandemic. Here is their experience.

Our kids are gone, and we thought we would be empty nesters. Then we had the opportunity to house Caitlin, our daughter’s good friend since kindergarten, in Angela’s room when she moved out. It has been a joy to have our daughter’s lifelong friend here, for well over a year now. After Caitlin graduated college and got a job, she started paying rent for her disabled mother, whose income is very limited. Now that Caitlin has been laid off because of COVID-19, she still has a place to call home, with us.

Since our son John Michael has been teaching and living in San Francisco for five years, his room was mostly unoccupied. Karl’s cousin’s daughter Roxanne had been living with her boyfriend in Echo Park for the past five years, doing freelance work in arts and entertainment. The relationship broke up this past November, and Roxanne was planning to move back to North Carolina. When we invited her to live with us if she preferred to stay in LA, Roxanne thought about it, then in January she moved in to our home. Since COVID-19 hit, she has been sheltering in place with Janet, Caitlin and me. 

We are happy to have these two lovely young people living with us as we collectively self-isolate, and are happy to have been able to offer them a place to live. They offer us a lot of youthful energy, and expert advice on technology and internet platforms. If Janet and I were alone in the house and did not go out at all, we might be rather lonely, but having two lively young women in the house makes things a lot of fun. It’s really a win-win situation!

—Karl Lisovsky